Who's Liable for Crimes Committed With a 3D Printed Gun?

Below:

Next story in Tech and gadgets

With the announcement this week that a handgun made from a 3D
printer fired successfully, 3D manufacturers may soon find
themselves in a gray area when it comes to liability. From the
looks of it, these companies aren’t ready for the new wave of
customers and responsibility this might bring.

According to the BBC, designs for the Liberator plastic pistol
have been downloaded more than 100,000 times already — before the
U.S. government ordered that the designs be taken down for fear
they may violate arms-exporting laws.

Still, the designs are out there, accessible through sites such
as The Pirate Bay. “Makers,” or hobbyists, with their own
3D printers, such as the MakerBot Replicator 2 ($2,199) and
3DSystems CubeX ($2,499), are presumably still free to print it
and whatever else they want. [See also:
3D Printers at Maker Faire: Faster, Cheaper, Easier to Use ]

But makers without their own equipment also have the option of
ordering various objects from 3D printing services such as
i.materialise, Sculpteo and Shapeways. Each service offers users
the opportunity to shop existing designs as well as create and
use their own.

There are far more hobbyist makers than manufacturers, but 3D
printing at home is far from commonplace. Judging from designs
and items found online, most of what’s being produced is fairly
innocuous — think jewelry,
smartphone cases and troll dolls. Perhaps that's why these
companies seem unprepared for potential crises.

A survey of these sites yielded no obvious lists of prohibited
designs. Repeated requests from TechNewsDaily yielded no clear
answers either. In fact, only one company had any answers at
all.

MakerBot, the sole
respondent, doesn’t print items for consumers, but it does sell
3D printers online and at MakerBot
stores in New York City. It also hosts an online forum called
Thingiverse, where makers share designs with each other. MakerBot
spokeswoman Jenifer Howard sent the following message: "Our
Acceptable Use Policy in section 3.3 of the Terms describes use
of the Site 'to collect, upload, transmit, display or distribute
any User Content... (ii) that...promotes illegal activities or
contributes to the creation of weapons...' as a
violation." The “illegal activities” were not further
defined, again despite our multiple requests for clarification.

Shapeways spokeswoman
Elisa Richardson has previously
acknowledged to TechNewsDaily (in an inquiry about
counterfeiting) that her company couldn’t check every
user-submitted design. But she did specify that guns are
prohibited. Thingiverse alone hosts some 80,000 user-uploaded
designs, with more coming in every day. All this raises the
question: How carefully can companies monitor for the production
of gun parts or other weapons?

There are plastic gun replicas already in the mix, like the
DC17 Animated
Clone Trooper Blaster Prop on Thingiverse. And home printers
are coming down in price. At Solidoodle,you can pick up a 3D
printer for $499. The basic materials are changing as well.
Currently, home 3D printers produce items made of plastic, but
commercial printers can handle gold, silver and stainless steel.
As the list of potential materials grows, prices will fall and
options expand. But the potential threat already exists.

Defense Distributed’s Liberator plastic pistol uses just one
metal piece, a piece that’s not necessary, but was included to
make it visible to metal detectors in order to avoid violating
federal law. That law — the Undetectable Firearms Act — is set to
expire at the end of this year.

All this puts manufacturers of 3D-printed materials in a gray
area from a legal standpoint. Questions arise – could 3D printers
and print manufacturers be bound to turn suspicious customers
over to authorities? And what are the liability repercussions if,
say, a car component is manufactured and then fails? When you
consider that smokers have successfully sued tobacco companies,
these questions don’t seem so far-fetched.